


Advent

by scuttlingclaws



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Seisen no Keifu | Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War
Genre: everyone's favorite archbishop!, some major depictions of violence/injury, specifically by fire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:42:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28137873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scuttlingclaws/pseuds/scuttlingclaws
Summary: A look at Manfroy, Archbishop of the Lopt Sect, and how he rose to power.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6
Collections: Fire Emblem Writer's Zine





	Advent

_We do unto ourselves what our Lord Loptous has decreed we are deserving of. Humans are the lowliest of creatures, undeserving of the world our Lord left us. We are forever indebted to Him, and the only way to repent and repay is to suffer._ Those words rang loudly in Manfroy’s ears, nearly covering the jeers and taunts by the townsfolk as he and his friends were tied to stakes, the ground at their feet now littered with kindling. All he wanted to do was venture out, away from the cold, damp cave he and the other followers of Loptous resided in. For a brief moment it was wonderful; he, alongside his closest friends, felt the warm heat of the sun on his face and breathed in the sweet scent of flowers. He could have recalled the scent more clearly if the acrid scent of lamp oil was not clogging his nostrils. They had even gotten to play with the children in the nearest village, but when their parents came to check on them...that was when the trouble started.

“This is what they deserve!”  
“Even the children are dangerous.”  
“Disgusting cultists! May they burn with their dark god!”

_The others inflict upon us what they deserve to have done unto themselves. We are all unworthy sinners, but to attack us and our kin, those who are aware of and repent for our shortcomings, make them even lower than even Loptous himself could have ever imagined._

  
He was used to the calm before the storm, the quiet before the crack of the whip against his back, but this was something different. When the elders, or himself, punished the others it was for an entirely different reason; it was to repent. To apologize for the grave sin of existing in a world that was not meant for him. To atone for what Naga had done in the human’s stead. There was vitriol in this town that he had never encountered the likes of which before. Of course, this was not the first time he had waited to be hurt; he was used to the deafening silence before the whip cracked across his back. But this was different. Before it was the elders he had known all his life, exacting the punishment he deserved, the one they preached about each day, who used to go as slowly or quickly as he requested. This was a mob who cared not of repentance, but of anger and venom. Manfroy could only watch in horror as a man stood in front of him and his friends, holding a piece of iron and flint in his hands.

“Burn in Hell,” he said and Manfroy couldn’t tell if the glint he saw was from the man’s eyes or from the iron striking the flint.

  
Just as quickly as the elder’s whip snapped, he was suddenly engulfed in flames. It was a pain unlike anything he had felt before, but in a flash, it was gone. He couldn’t feel anything, not anymore, and could only watch in abject horror as his skin blackened and changed before his very eyes. He could tell that his body was being pulled into a position he never willed his muscles to take, but he couldn’t feel it, oh Loptous, he couldn’t feel it. He could see that his friends, too, were screaming, crying, begging for Loptous to take them and he wanted that. He needed it, too.

  
But he never got it.

  
When Manfroy opened his eyes he thought he was dead. If there were a hell surely this was it; waking up with the scent of smoking laying heavily in his nostrils and seeing the charred corpses of the friends he had asked to venture out into the world with him lay there. It was what he would have deserved, he thought. But the more time that passed, as he turned his gaze towards the sky, the more certain he was that he was alive. Living, breathing. He dragged himself to his feet, limping towards the secret underground hiding place of the Lopt Sect.

___

The most remarkable thing about Manfroy after his unexpected return to his home was not the way a once cheerful, intelligent boy had become a shell of his former self, but the curious way he could no longer feel pain. Where he once whimpered and cried at the feeling of whips and other instruments as they punctured his skin there was silence - only broken by the sound of Manfroy asking the elders whether or not they had hit him. The fire may have been the start, but nothing really truly changed until he had returned.

  
He had been paraded, praised, worshipped. Proclaimed as a messenger of Loptous himself; how could a child survive the flames? That is unless a god were to look over them. Further evidence of this was his inability to feel anything. Neither pain nor pleasure reached the ashes of his nerves. The pastors had proclaimed that Manfroy was saved. That he was protected from the pain that ravaged the others because he was chosen and there was no ignoring that. When he arose from the delirium of smoke and flame he was no longer a man. He became a god.

  
At least, that’s what he would have assumed if he were as pompous and arrogant as the young Duke of Velthomer. He had been so incredibly easy to manipulate, to bend to the will of Loptous. With all his talk of his ideals and how he would do whatever it took to reach them. Even now the man feebly fought against the Church and his son but the end was near. It had already been decided in the ashes of Belhalla, all those years ago. While it was certainly...satisfying to see the brethren of the villagers who burned him all those years ago, nothing could match the overwhelming ecstasy of being chosen by one’s god. Searing pain had turned into blistering pleasure over time. He barely remembered the faces of his friends, but he could never forget looking into the flames and seeing a dragon’s silhouette in the embers.

  
He would prove to Loptous this was no mistake; that he was the right man for the job. It would have been easy to just take the descendant of Naga, his sworn enemy, and simply execute her, leaving her body headless and forgotten in the deepest cells of Velthomer Castle. But where was the flair? The beauty? Dare he say...the poetics? Little brought Manfroy pleasure. Not women, not drinks, not even the sweet taste of victory that danced across his tongue. Enacting his revenge on the people of Jugdral and the descendants of Naga was the only thing that could possibly bring him any amount of joy since the day his life changed, the boy he once was reaching heaven in thin wisps of smoke. That Manfroy was dead; ashes in the wind so that he could properly serve the will of Loptous.

  
With the girl under his control and the Book of Naga locked away in the castle, there was no way they could lose. The end was nigh, and the better of two dragons would prevail.


End file.
